Answer:  What should be included in the Content Map? What aspects of online learning and technology are essential to integrate in the process? Create:  Isolate a web tool explored in this lesson, and then create a Content Map for the chosen topic using that web tool. Be sure to highlight technology tools used in your lesson plan. The Content Map displayed below was created using Bubbl . To view the map in a new tab, click here . For our current natural selection unit in my blended biology classroom, students are responsible for learning about the influences that shaped Charles Darwin's theory and how it has affected our modern understanding of biology. I created this Content Map to illustrate the connections between learning goals, learning tasks, and the technology resources used in their online learning during the first major section of this unit. Content mapping is a great way to effectively plan for instruction and assessment. A few benefits are outlined here: ...

Research: Link to five time management tools in your blog. Briefly describe each tool’s use and relevance to the online world. Answer: How is each tool used? Would the tool be most helpful in a personal or professional setting, or both? Explain. 1. Stay Focused Google Extension - This add-on for Google Chrome limits the amount of time you can spend on time-wasting websites like Facebook, YouTube etc. It is highly personalized, allowing you to block whole sites, subdomains or pages, even content within a page (video, games, etc). Once your allotted time for a site has been used up, it remains blocked for the remainder of the day. It's like parental controls... for parents. :) This could be used for professional time management, by limiting access to certain websites until my planning period. It could used on a personal level by limiting the amount of time I spent on social media. 2. Strict Workflow Google Extension - This add-on for Chrome also aids in time management by help...

Answer: How has the Communicate module prepared you to meet each standard listed above? Please reference each standard by providing specific examples or links from your work in Communicate. Which strategies will you take away from the Communicate module and apply to your own teaching practices?  Which lessons were most beneficial for you?? Standard C:  The online teacher plans, designs, and incorporates strategies to encourage active learning, application, interaction, participation, and collaboration in the online environment. Standard D :   The online teacher promotes student success through clear expectations, prompt responses, and regular feedback. Standard E :  The online teacher models, guides, and encourages legal, ethical, and safe behavior related to technology use. Standard J:  The online teacher interacts in a professional, effective manner with colleagues, parents, and other members of the community to support students’ success. Stand...

Answer:  How do communication practices in the online environment correlate to effective feedback? Why is authentic feedback important for online learners? In what ways might an instructor enrich a student’s online experience through feedback? Continuous communication and effective feedback are both directly linked to student success, especially in an online environment. Students in a hybrid or online course often miss out on the informal forms of feedback that students would receive a traditional classroom: Q&A with the teacher, reading the teacher's body language and facial expressions during conversations, being able to engage in discussions. It's crucial that online instructors maintain open lines of communication and multiple means of communication to "pick up the slack" in these areas. Authentic feedback is important for online learners -- as it is for any learner -- because it gives them an idea of where they stand with regard to the standards or learni...

Create:  Utilizing one of the resources discussed in this lesson, create a rubric that integrates specific criteria for an assignment and also affords the instructor ample commentary on the student’s product. Make the rubric available in a post in your blog. Click to open my Nervous System Flowchart Rubric . The rubric found at the link here was created with inspiration from Karen Franker's   Rubric for Graphic Organizers - Inspiration Diagrams/Concept Maps,  available here . In my anatomy classes, students have been learning about the nervous system and its structural and functional divisions. Students will summarize their understanding of these various divisions and subdivisions by creating a flowchart. In a blended or online classroom, this would most likely be created using a tech tool for creating graphic organizers such as Popplet or Inspiration. In this traditional class though, students also have the option to complete the assignment on paper if they wish. ...

Create:  Using the examples above as a point of reference, create three original digital resources that could be utilized when evaluating student work. Then discuss in your blog how these resources would enhance the level of specific feedback offered to students. I'm currently in an online teaching endorsement program, and in one of our recent courses we have been learning about the importance of targeted feedback. (The artifacts shared here are some things I've recycled from submissions to my endorsement instructor). Candidates in the program have been taught that it is important that feedback must be aligned to the standards and learning objectives, timely, positive, and instructional. Lessons in the TOOL have been very closely aligned with what I've been learning in my endorsement program. One very interesting thing that I learned from Communicate 3, Lesson 1 is that there is an important difference in praise an encouragement. I know that I personally am "guilty...

Create:  Choose a standards-based area of study and create an assignment. Then create a method for assessing student work utilizing one of the mediums discussed in this lesson. Ensure the tool demonstrates an instructor’s employment of effective feedback. In a recent unit on evolution, students studied Charles Darwin and the various theories, experiences, and persons who shaped his explanation of evolution by natural selection. Students were then asked to create a product that summarizes their understanding of people and experiences that shaped Charles Darwin. Below I've outlined the details of the assignment, provided an example of a student submission, and an artifact showing my feedback to the student. STANDARDS: The Georgia Standards of Excellence for Biology that are assessed in this assignment are below: SB6. Obtain, evaluate, and communicate information to assess the theory of evolution. a. Construct an explanation of how new understandings of Earth’s history, the emerg...